U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley resigns

Former governor of South Carolina plans to step down at the end of the year.

U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley is leaving the Trump administration at the end of the year. (Calla Kessler/The Washington Post)

President Trump said Tuesday that U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley is leaving the administration at the end of the year. Trump spoke as he and Haley met in the Oval Office, shortly after word came of her plans to resign.

He called Haley a “very special” person, adding she had told him six months ago that she might want to take some time off. Trump said that together they had “solved a lot of problems.”

Haley, 46, was appointed to the post in November 2016. Last month, she coordinated Trump’s second trip to the United Nations, including his first time chairing the Security Council.

“It was a blessing to go into the U.N. every day with body armor,” said Haley, meaning that her job was to defend America on the world stage.

No reason for the resignation was immediately provided. Haley, who has been rumored to be considering a run for office in the future, said at the White House, “No I’m not running in 2020.” She endorsed the president and expressed her support for him when he runs for reelection.

Trump said that he is considering many candidates for Haley’s job and that a new ambassador would be named in two to three weeks.

“I proudly serve in this administration, and I enthusiastically support most of its decisions and the direction it is taking the country,” Haley wrote in an opinion piece for the New York Times. “But I don’t agree with the president on everything.”

Before she was named by Trump to her U.N. post, Haley was elected the first female governor of South Carolina and the second Indian American to hold that position.